The Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) is a dead organization that does not take decisions with an economic or social impact for the citizens, PAS MP Vitali Gavrouc stated in a public debate hosted by IPN. The MP of the ruling party noted that the state institutions are attentively analyzing the functioning of all the agreements within the CIS and a decision as to the termination of invalid or outdated agreements will be taken afterward.
The representative of the Parity of Action and Solidarity said the authorities decided to assess the impact of the CIS agreements and to eventually terminate the nonfunctional agreements as there are provisions that remain on paper only, without offering benefits to the citizens.
“A process of such a scale last for many years. There are situations when the citizens cannot obtain legal records from the Russian Federation. The procedure was simpler earlier. The legal records were obtained through the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the citizens didn’t need to go to Russia. But this communication between institutions now does not work. It goes to the geopolitical situation, the war, the absence of confidence. Respectively, if we speak about affiliation to a community, it goes not only to rights, but also to responsibilities and both of the sides should have these. As we form part of this community, we have problems in terms of extradition too. So, these are aspects that do not work within the CIS. The Republic of Moldova can fulfill its obligations in this regard, while the states with which we signed agreements cannot,” stated Vitali Gavrouc.
According to him, instead of the agreements with the CIS, Moldova wants to redirect the dialogue to each state that holds interest for our country. The bans imposed by Russia on Moldovan products are an additional proof of the fact that the CIS became an irrelevant entity for Moldova.
“We have proper cooperation in the energy sector with Azerbaijan. We have proper cooperation with two states that do not form part of the CIS, but were part of the Soviet Union – Georgia and Ukraine. We now aim to turn these agreements functional on bilateral basis. It will be a transition process. We are analyzing things through the angle of the citizens’ interest. There are over 300 agreement and they must bring a visible benefit,” explained the PAS MP.
He also said that the citizens made a clear choice of the geopolitical course in elections, when they voted massively for entry into the EU. The CIS is an outdated body that does not generate solutions to people’s problems.
“We are also withdrawing from the agreement to finance the CIS television company MIR, which does not obey the deontological norms. The withdrawal from all the agreements is a long-lasting process. But if we join the European Union, there will be incompatibilities and challenges with which we will need to cope. Looking at the geopolitical course, the European Union or the Eurasian Union, we see that the citizens already made a choice, but these two entities cannot be compared. The European Union is a solid, functional body, while the Eurasian Union is an inexistent organization as it does not have content. The CIS is a dead organization that holds only protocol meetings and does not take decisions with a social or economic impact,” stated Vitali Gavrouc.
The public debate entitled “Partial withdrawal from CIS agreements: Reasons and effects” was the 276th installment of IPN’s project “Developing Political Culture through Public Debates” that is supported by the Hanns Seidel Foundation.